Chapter Forty-Seven: Playing the Piano

Jiang Chuan's lips finally pressed down, lightly touching Lin Yu's warm lips, tracing the soft shape of her lips, and occasionally sticking out his tongue to sweep across her lip peaks.

Lin Yu felt a ticklish sensation from the licking and tried to push it away, but Jiang Chuan grabbed her hands and raised them above her head. During the brief separation, Jiang Chuan looked down at Lin Yu, whose face was flushed.

His hair was scattered messily on the sofa, and the collar of his pajamas had long since slipped off his shoulders. A dark undercurrent surged in his eyes, and the destructive urge within him rose and clamored, finally forcing him to lower his head and kiss him heavily once more.

The kiss was fierce and domineering, with an irresistible force, unlike Jiang Chuan's usual calm and self-possessed demeanor.

He gnawed and tore at Lin Yu's pink lower lip, taking advantage of her gasping for breath in pain to penetrate her deeply. His tongue swept across her pearly teeth, tracing the delicate inner walls of her mouth, savoring the aroma of beer and the sweet scent of cake.

Jiang Chuan's bangs obscured Lin Yu's view, causing her to miss the fleeting glimpse of obsessive madness in his eyes. His warm hand slipped under the hem of her nightgown, lingering along her bare waist and legs.

Lin Yu's heart pounded. She abruptly turned her head away from the long kiss, a trail of saliva escaping her lips as they parted. She breathed heavily. "Hands...hands are so sticky," she murmured, her voice filled with childlike panic, like a herbivore trying to escape the clutches of a predator.

Jiang Chuan's Adam's apple bobbed. He restrained himself and withdrew his hand, gently pinching her full, flushed cheeks. He turned off the projector, picked her up, and carried her straight to the master bathroom.

This wasn't the first time Lin Yu had entered Jiang Chuan's bedroom, but it was the first time he had come to his private bathroom, completely breaking the barrier between the two of them.

Jiang Chuan turned on the tap, squeezed out a pump of hand sanitizer, and immersed her fingers one by one in the warm water, rubbing the sweet, creamy residue in circles with her fingertips.

This position left Lin Yu completely nestled in his embrace, once again placed in the narrow space Jiang Chuan had created. Lin Yu's abdomen pressed against the cool edge of the sink, with Jiang Chuan's firm, burning chest behind him.

He was a full head taller than her, embracing her tightly from behind, his chin resting on the top of her head, enveloping her entirely in his impenetrable shadow.

Warm water flowed gently, and Lin Yu, enveloped by a misplaced sense of security, gradually lowered her guard, leaned her head against Jiang Chuan's chest, and closed her eyes. For some reason, tears welled up unexpectedly, sliding down her cheeks and flowing down her neck into her collar.

Jiang Chuan looked at the two figures reflected in the mirror, his fingertips, wet with water droplets, brushed over her tear tracks, trying to wipe away Lin Yu's tears, but only making her face even wetter.

The water had soaked a large area of ​​Lin Yu's pajamas, making the fabric semi-transparent and clinging tightly to his body, vaguely revealing the color of his skin underneath. His breath hitched; the sound of their heartbeats drowned out the water and was clearly audible.

Jiang Chuan held Lin Yu's waist as it slid down. The mirror reflected her soft body, which was completely exposed to him. The bathroom light shone on her milky white skin, making the wetness on her lips even more vivid. Jiang Chuan knew where that wetness came from.

His Adam's apple bobbed violently as he swallowed with difficulty. He grasped his slender white fingers, which had already been washed clean, and used his other hand to reach up to Lin Yu's lips, his thumb grinding heavily against her lower lip.

Upon hearing a soft moan, he suddenly gripped Lin Yu's sharp chin with his thumb and forefinger, turning her to face the mirror and kissing her.

The sudden kiss caused Lin Yu's hands to flailing wildly, knocking over the faucet. A torrent of water sprayed over them, soaking them completely.

Jiang Chuan briefly stepped back, turned off the tap, and haphazardly gathered his soaked hair behind his head, revealing his sharp brows and scarlet eyes.

His usually gentle and warm eyes became narrow and sharp, extremely aggressive. Water droplets trickled down his chin and onto Lin Yu's collarbone. Jiang Chuan captured her hazy gaze in the mirror, his thin lips brushing against her flushed earlobe. "Can you play the piano?"

Lin Yu was still in a daze, her wet hair clinging to her flushed cheeks. Jiang Chuan deftly peeled off her water-soaked nightgown, grabbed a bath towel from the side, wrapped it around her from behind, and gently wiped the water droplets off her body.

Lin Yu's body was now exposed, and the alcohol and embarrassment made her skin as red and translucent as a ripe tomato. The rustling sound of fabric against fabric came from behind her.

Lin Yu saw Jiang Chuan unbuttoning his shirt one button at a time through the mirror. The soaked fabric clung to his muscular waist and abdomen, gradually opening as he moved to reveal his well-defined abs.

This was the first time she had seen his body openly since his injury. Under the warm yellow light of the bathroom, every inch of his skin looked as if it had been meticulously sculpted.

Her breath became hot and sticky, her mind filled with the thunder and lightning before the typhoon passed, while Jiang Chuan seemed to be standing in the eye of the storm, his expression calm and undisturbed.

He wrapped Lin Yu up in a bath towel again and led her to the grand piano in the living room. Moonlight streamed through the French windows, flowing across the dark piano lid.

Lin Yu noticed it when he first visited. He thought it was just an exquisite decoration among Jiang Chuan's cool-toned furniture, but he didn't expect that it could actually play it, and play it so well.

The piano lid was tightly shut, like a faithful wait for the arrival of a beloved. Jiang Chuan led Lin Yu to sit on the piano bench and lifted the lid. His slender fingers glided smoothly across the keys, creating a series of trembling sounds.

The moment the first note sounded, Lin Yu felt a subtle electric current creep up her spine, as if the piano, along with herself, had awakened under Jiang Chuan's fingertips.

Jiang Chuan's palm covered Lin Yu's hand, guiding her slender fingers to the cool piano keys. Lin Yu was encircled between his arms and the piano, her fingertips following his guidance as they moved across the black and white keys, like a manipulated puppet, yet willingly surrendering.

A soothing melody flowed between their intertwined fingers. The moonlight shifted hazily in the night, its silvery glow scattering like feathers, gently caressing Lin Yu's bare skin with each note.

Lin Yu was immersed in the sensory world created by Jiang Chuan. The music flowed like a thin mist, languid and unrestrained, making her unconsciously sigh softly in comfort.

Jiang Chuan's fingers precisely controlled every transition, allowing the subtle layers of the music to ripple outwards, gradually permeating her skin and bones.

Lin Yu seemed to float on the moonlit sea, lifted up by his melody, each note stirring a secret shiver.

As the lingering notes of Debussy's "Clair de Lune" faded, Lin Yu remained immersed in its hazy afterglow, unable to pull herself away. Jiang Chuan, however, had already seized her wrist and spun into the next intense and uncontrollable melody.

The piano music surged forth like a violent tide, its elegant and romantic melody masking a suppressed brutality and pain. Lin Yu was seduced and engulfed by this surging wave of sound; his fingers couldn't keep up with the rhythm, slipping off the keys several times, only to be forcefully caught by Lin Yu's hand and pressed against the back of his hand.

The melody of "La Dolce Vita" became a secret emotional connection between the two, conveying their unspoken predicament through the rise and fall of the piano keys. Jiang Chuan slammed his hands down on the keys with heavy emphasis, as if venting some kind of burning desire in his heart.

Lin Yu's heart was gripped by an invisible force, and tears welled up uncontrollably once again. Amid Jiang Chuan's intense comforting words, she felt the unfathomable bitterness and emptiness behind the melody.

Lin Yu caught a fleeting glimpse of escape in Jiang Chuan's piano music; those emotions he had never spoken aloud were now pouring out through the violent notes.

Her back was pressed against his chest, her breath ragged and broken with the intense rhythm, tears streaming down her face. The distorted harmonies and the rising, unfamiliar pleasure intertwined, becoming the most naked language between them.

The vibrations from the vibrating soundbox traveled through her bones to her chest, as if two vibrant hearts were beating in unison within her body. The music gradually reached its climax with its ever-increasing tempo.

Lin Yu instinctively tilted his head back, breathing as if he were about to suffocate, letting himself and Jiang Chuan sink into this illusory sweetness, each syllable seeming to push their souls toward deeper destruction.

She absurdly felt that dying amidst this exquisite music might be a kind of romance.

At this moment, she finally understood that this piano was not a cold decoration, but Jiang Chuan's burning and restless soul imprisoned within its black and white keys.

Under the influence of alcohol and the music, Lin Yu's memory became blurred and confused. He could no longer remember how many pieces he had played with Jiang Chuan that night, nor could he recall the names of those melodies.

In the end, she was simply led by him, tirelessly repeating the playing over and over again, her fingers moving mechanically up and down the keys like a marionette.

The music was sometimes fast and sometimes slow, and her mind and body gradually fell apart between extreme excitement and exhaustion.

In her final moments before plunging into darkness, all she could see in her blurred vision was Jiang Chuan bending down to kiss the appendix scar on her abdomen. Lin Yu's eyelashes trembled slightly, and blurry images from her childhood flashed before her eyes.

The operating room lights still feel glaring and cold in my memory, and the ticking of the monitor is particularly clear in the darkness. Six-year-old girl curled up on the hospital bed, and the pain after the anesthesia wore off surged like a tide.

She tried hard to recall, but she couldn't remember if her father had appeared in those images. Had he stood by her bedside? Had he held her trembling, helpless hand?

From that moment on, his father's absence became the norm during crucial moments in Lin Yu's life. Ultimately, his presence faded into blank dates on the calendar.

Years later, she is no longer afraid of the darkness itself, but she is still afraid of everything that the darkness symbolizes: the abandoned loneliness and the emptiness of no one responding, as well as the long and silent nights in which she swallows her pain alone.

Now, Jiang Chuan has forcefully filled the void left by the father's absence.

He was just like that bottle of chemical reagent he accidentally tasted in his father's laboratory when he was a child. It was transparent and clear, with an enticing sweet aroma, but it tasted burning and sour, carrying a hidden poison, dangerous yet irresistibly drawing people in.